Is that based in any way on the relative capabilities and security track records of OpenWRT and pfSense, or is a highly security-conscious userbase merely what's left for pfSense after eliminating anyone who wants good WiFi support and the ability to run on cheap commodity consumer appliances with tight memory and storage limits?
For obvious reasons (targeting embedded devices with limited flash) it's not the default, but for devices which can support it, HTTPS is easily enabled.
opkg install wget ca-bundle
sed -i "s/http/https/" /etc/opkg/distfeeds.conf
Done. And now packages have cryptographic signatures verified and are downloaded over HTTPS.
Asking as a curious OpenWRT devotee.